Kenny Chesney Shares ‘Songs for the Saints’ Title Track [LISTEN]

Kenny Chesney has shared the title track of what will surely be a emotional album, Songs for the Saints. Readers can press play above to hear "Song for the Saints."

"Song for the Saints" opens softly, with the strums of an acoustic guitar as Chesney sings, "Long before a boat anchored the harbor / Long before steel drums filled the breeze / God lifted these islands from the ocean / They stood strong for centuries / So it's fitting that they were named after men with golden halos / 'Cause angels don't give in just 'cause a little wind blows ..." Chesney owned a home on the island of St. John, which Hurricane Irma left devastated in the late summer and early fall of 2017; he was inspired to write Songs for the Saints after seeing firsthand how residents of the Virgin Islands came to together after Irma and Hurricane Maria.

“There’s so much to say, and so much music on this record. Knowing where to start was hard and easy, because this is the song that really holds everything together," Chesney says in a press release. "It’s a tribute to those islands and their unstoppable spirit. Even as people were coming off the islands -- some just to not tax the limited resources -- so many of my friends were digging in, trying to figure out what needed to be done and getting on to the work of clearing debris, creating habitable space for those staying and reminding all of us how Island Strong they all are.”

“When I arrived on St. John, on a day off after taking a ferry all by myself, I walked down a street in a very special place and heard George Jones floating out a door of a bar,” Chesney recalls of one of his first experiences in the area. “I walked in, sat on a barstool and found people from all over the country who had hearts like mine: dreamers who were free spirits, living a way that made sense to them.

"I left that day, went back out on tour, but kept going back, because it was a place I not only fit, but felt like I could disappear," he adds. "I was a young adult, and I made some of the best friends of my life on those islands -- and this is my way of giving back.”

Songs for the Saints will be released on July 27. Chesney previously shared "Get Along" as the first single off the 12-track project, and "Song for the Saints" is available for purchase on iTunes now.